To maintain an 11 carrier navy, a change in law that occurred in 2011 where the requirement had been 15, the Senate armed services committees approved in the National Defense Authorization Act a transfer of up to $650 million from shipbuilding accounts for refueling and overhauling the USS George Washington.

Senators also agreed to forestall the retirement of the A10.  It does allow the Air Force to move up to 36 of the approximately 300 A10’s into a backup status to facilitate maintenance on the fielding of the F35.  The shortage of trained maintainers was the latest excuse the Air Force presented to support sending the A10’s to the boneyard.  The logic gets squirrely when one considers the F35 is the primary replacement for the F16.

The Senate also blocked the Army’s cost cutting measure of retiring all Kiowa Scout helicopters and moving all Apache gunships to the active component to save over $3 billion. Instead the Army will only be allowed to move four dozen Apaches from the Guard.  The original initiative was hotly contested by the Guard and state politicians who wanted to maintain the combat helicopter in its ranks even though they would have been largely replaced with Blackhawks which are suitable for disaster relief but not as sexy as the Apache gunship.  Arguments’ highlighting it takes six National Guard Apache battalions to cover the deployments of two active-duty battalions primarily because of restrictions on how much Guard members can be tapped for duty.  It also takes longer to get Guard units ready for deployment.

The National Defense Authorization Act still needs to finish its journey to becoming law as the House and Senate versions are reconciled before they head to the President for signature.